Friday, June 27, 2008

KATZ UP!

Pretty good Sun headline, eh? Eh? BAM.

Three new pieces on Daryl Katz today in the Edmonton Journal, all by David Staples. They are very interesting stories, in particular "The Impossible Dream," which begins a six-part piece by Staples on Katz and the EIG. Of note: it looks like Patrick LaForge is safe in his job, and it appears that Katz is going to follow the "Why Downtown? It has to be downtown" plan and ask taxpayers to foot the vast majority of the bill on a new downtown arena, despite the fact that he's got the money to pay for it himself, there's little to no economic benefit to citizens to pay for such a venture, and the quality of life of Edmontonians and Oilers hockey fans will not be lessened by the team's continued presence in the current Rexall Place. Sadly, no word yet on buying out the Sheldon Souray contract, or on the coup d'état making Fernando Pisani the Mayor of Edmonton (and my pants*). So, some things change, some things stay the same.

>>I doubt Katz is holding 40% of his wealth (half a billion) in money.

I suspect he'd be forced to sell a store chain or two to finance the arena himself.<<

Huh? I'd have to think Katz personal wealth is separate from Katz Group (meaning there's no reason he'd have to sell a store chain). Secondly, financing it doesn't mean forking over cash. Later in your comment you mention a mortgage. Something tells me Katz could get one.

Bottom line, taxpayer involvement--in any form--has to be minimized. The other new NHL arenas in this country were privately funded. Same should be true here as well.

No, not like I own a microwave. Katz Group may be privately held, but I'd be shocked if it's not incorporated. In that case, the company's assets are not his assets per se (like owning a microwave). Katz is undoubtedly a shareholder (private corps still have shares), so, if his personal wealth isn't liquid enough, he might have to sell shares or something. Not necessarily easy with a privately held corp... Borrowing against that asset (shares) would probably be easier.

Anyway, I was responding to the point that Katz would "be forced to sell a store chain or two to finance the area himself." I maintain that's a completely baseless assumption.

So does the Visnovsky deal mean that Pitkanen is out. I was totally against it before getting Visnovksy. But now... if we can get a top calibre winger... I'd be ok with it. Ideally we get a winger UFA and keep all the defensemen we now have.

Whether we agree or not, one of Andy's references stated that the brilliant minds at city hall will want to contribute so that they have some say over the development. I'd bet that Katz (errr..."Rexall Sports Corp.") would prefer to finance the whole thing.

That's one of the lesser considered facets of this whole thing that is, in my opinion, of paramount importance.

The city can make a better argument for some say in development if they have at least some hand in financing it.

Whatever the current perception of Katz may be, benevolent businessman or something else, he's still at his core a keen and efficient businessman. His unfettered control over a significant downtown development may not be in the best interests of the city.

Obviously, there will be resultant cries that there shouldn't be the downtown development at all, but like it or not Mandel and others have made it clear that it will be going ahead one way or the other. That being said, Mandel is a pretty malleable public figure, so if enough public outcry is made known to him he may reconsider.

I know that he has his assistants keep a tally of daily calls to the Mayor's office and the reason for the call. At some points he apparently used to field the calls himself for certain hours of the day. If enough people called in complaining I'm sure he would take notice.

His unfettered control over a significant downtown development may not be in the best interests of the city.

That made me feel like I live in a comic book. Maybe he broods over a giant model reconstruction of the city in a room in his house, contemplating ways to take it over? I know I certainly would. I'd have it all laid out on a table map, and I'd have one of those push sticks you always see the military guys use in the movies, too, so that I could move pieces around. And my signature would be that I always ate mini-carrots while I plotted mayhem. My minions would cringe in fear whenever I took a bite. Yeah, that would be sweet.

He's got that, too. And Risk: 2100. And Star Wars Risk. And two or three versions of regular Risk. And a couple of other variants that I can't even think of offhand, one of which involves some sort of underworld for vanquished units.